by Dave Edlund
“I’m quite familiar with the Begin Doctrine,” David answered, referring to a fundamental tenet of Israeli foreign policy to use pre-emptive force in self-defense.
Yossi deferred to Benjamin. “David, one simply needs to read the newspaper to understand that Jews are constantly under threat. Persecution of our brothers and sisters is becoming more common. Last week a teenager was knifed to death in Lyon, France, by two immigrants simply because he was Jewish. In London, the Faithful have been advised not to appear in public wearing the kippah for fear of retribution by Muslims. Hezbollah continues to harass our northern border, and Fatah is constantly planning and launching raids across our southern border. And it has only been three weeks since the terrorist attack in Eilat. We know that attack was orchestrated by Hezbollah and financed by Iranian agents.”
The Prime Minister’s shoulders slumped under the great weight of it all. The deadly terrorist attack at the gorgeous Hilton Queen of Sheba hotel in the port city of Eilat was still a fresh wound in Israel. Known for the gorgeous snorkeling and scuba diving nearby in the Red Sea, the Queen of Sheba hotel was packed with tourists, mostly Israelis, on holiday. Six Hezbollah terrorists—three men and three women, posing as couples on vacation—went on a killing rampage. They wandered the halls and lobby of the hotel for over an hour, firing automatic weapons and tossing grenades into the terrified crowds using tactics copied from the Pakistani terrorists who had nearly destroyed the Taj Mahal Palace hotel in Mumbai in 2008.
Eventually, all six terrorists were shot dead by security troops, but not before 137 civilians—including children as young as two years old—were murdered. The nation was still mourning the loss.
“The Middle East has changed much since the 60s and 70s,” David objected. “The Arab Coalition we faced in those days no longer exists. It has been replaced with new alliances—ones that are much stronger. You said yourself that Russia and Iran are developing ties. And what of China?” He shook his head. “China does not have the energy resources she needs to fully modernize. Do you think China will miss an opportunity to ally with our oil-rich enemies?”
Yossi held his hands out at his sides, imploring the Prime Minister to keep an open mind. “David, please. Listen to Benjamin. Hear him out before you make a decision.”
Feldman turned to Benjamin and dipped his chin in a curt nod. “You have a plan?”
“Indeed. We must strike Iran a deathblow before the hard liners acquire even one atomic bomb. We will take advantage of the animosity between the Sunni majority of Saudi Arabia and the Shia clerics who have ruled Iran since 1979.”
For several silent minutes David Feldman considered what his advisers were saying. If Israel did strike first in accord with the Begin Doctrine, there was plenty of precedent for such action. Although the international community as a rule condemned first-strike military actions, the UN seemed to be willing to grant Israel more leeway in dealing with threats to her security.
“For the sake of argument, let’s imagine Israel does attack Iran. What do you suggest is the objective? There are no operational nuclear facilities, are there?” He raised an eyebrow with this last question as he locked eyes with Yossi.
Benjamin cleared his throat. “No. For the moment at least, there are no nuclear programs of any significance underway in Iran. And we must ensure they are never able to develop or purchase such weapons.”
“So you have said. What is it exactly that you suggest I do?”
Benjamin straightened his back and squared his shoulders. “For the sake of God, we must change the map of the Middle East forever. Our enemies must be defeated once and for all.”
Slowly, David Feldman rose from his chair. In silent contemplation he rounded his desk and stood toe to toe with his National Security and Intelligence advisers. “We can do this?”
Yossi and Benjamin both nodded.
“You have a plan?” David asked.
“We do,” Yossi answered. “I suggest we brief you fully, including the general staff.”
“It would be a historic achievement for Israel.” David rubbed his chin as he turned to pace across his office. “It would ensure our security for generations.”
“You would be a national hero,” Benjamin offered.
Feldman stopped, a disturbing thought suddenly coming to mind. “What if the plan fails? We cannot win a protracted battle with Iran. And what of Russia?”
For the first time since the meeting began, Benjamin Roshal offered a smile. “We have the backing of the American military. Russia will not intervene. And if the plan does not go as well as expected, the American war machine will prove to be an invincible ally as we defeat first Iran, then Syria and Iraq. Libya, Lebanon, and the Palestinian Territories will be ours for the taking.”
David snorted a disingenuous laugh. “You can’t possibly believe President Taylor will offer military support to Israel in this venture.”
“No,” replied Benjamin, a crafty smirk still plastered across his face, but the next U.S. President will.”
Chapter 1
New York City
February 2
Eli moved forward in purposeful strides. Head down, he wore dark glasses, gloves, and a black beret. The collar of his black wool overcoat was turned up to ward off the frigid air. A stiff leather messenger pouch hung at his side, the contents given to him by Benny Goldsmith, the Israeli Ambassador to the United States.
An experienced agent of Mossad, Eli never questioned orders. Questions were a luxury for naïve idealists and dreamers. That was not Eli. He was a warrior fighting for the survival of his people, his homeland. It was not his job to make policy, to decide what course of action should be taken. Rather, he was an implement of action to ensure the desired results were achieved.
Sometimes, that meant exporting the violence, so that others would understand.
Everything Eli did this night, from the way he dressed, to the locations he scouted and ultimately selected, to the timing of his actions—everything—was coldly calculated to send a message.
It was 3:00 a.m., and the sidewalks were all but deserted. He turned the corner into an alley behind Langan’s Pub, just off West 47th Street and a half block from Times Square. He passed a homeless man pressed tight against the brick wall, burrowed under a filthy blanket with the remains of a large cardboard box for cover. The rank odor of vomit, stale urine, and rotten food assaulted his senses.
Ahead, the mechanical rumble of heavy machinery announced the approach of a garbage truck a few seconds before its lights appeared at the opposite end of the alley. The truck was just turning off West 46th, right on schedule.
Eli jogged to a commercial refuse bin behind the pub. He only had a minute, maybe two, to complete his task without arousing suspicion from the truck driver. Plunging his hand into the messenger pouch, he retrieved a yellow-green object. It filled his hand as his fingers wrapped around the device, obscuring it from view of the security camera aimed from the far side of the alley toward the steel dumpster. With his free hand, he removed first a safety tie and then a metal ring attached to a pin. Then he carefully stuffed the grenade against a front wheel of the dumpster so that when the bin was pulled forward to be emptied, the lever would pop off and ignite the chemical fuze.
His task completed, Eli turned and swiftly exited on West 47th Street. As he crossed Times Square, the sharp report of the explosion was proof his mission had succeeded. He strode down another alley, placing three more grenades, before vanishing into the night.
s
The sanitation department driver was on autopilot. He’d been working this route for close to three years, long enough that the motions were more muscle memory than deliberate thought. With the diesel engine rumbling in idle, he hopped out of the cab and wrestled the dumpster forward about six feet. When the fragmentation grenade detonated, the driver was in the process of climbing back into the cab. The blast slammed the open cab door into his body, knocking him to the pavement. The dumpster cartwheeled in
to the air, landing with a clang twenty feet away. Dozens of steel fragments pierced the front of the garbage truck, including three that penetrated through the door and lodged in the driver’s thigh and shoulder.
Almost immediately, passersby appeared from nowhere, drawn in the alley by the sound of the explosion. Soon, sirens blared and two police cruisers arrived on the scene, their flashing colored lights adding to the chaos. A civilian was applying pressure to the worst of the driver’s leg wounds, stemming the flow of blood.
One of the officers was holding back the onlookers, whose ranks had grown to nearly a dozen, while the other was speaking over his radio to dispatch. “We have one victim, male, he’s conscious with multiple wounds. Request emergency medical help; this guy is bleeding pretty bad.”
“Dispatch. Roger request for med—”
The sharp crack of two nearly-simultaneous explosions drowned out the reply from dispatch. Reflexively, the two police officers ducked, but quickly it became apparent they were not in imminent danger. As the officer called in the report, one thought was foremost in his mind—It’s going to be a long night.
s
With a 20-block area surrounding Times Square evacuated and sealed off, NYC police along with agents from BATF and the FBI, scoured the area for clues as well as additional explosive devices. The security tape from the video camera by the first bomb had been reviewed, and law enforcement knew their prime suspect was male, with short black hair—possibly Middle Eastern—but it was not possible to pull many facial details from the images.
By noon, they had found only one unexploded device, a military hand grenade also placed at the base of a commercial trash bin close to Times Square. Fortunately, there was a surveillance camera nearby, and it showed images of the same suspect as from the first bombing. Declaring the streets safe, the evacuation order was lifted.
Considering the nature of the recovered device, plus evidence that the three exploded devices were fragmentation bombs, possibly hand grenades, the investigative lead was turned over to the FBI. Before the day was over, an explosive ordinance expert from the U.S. Army confirmed the unexploded grenade was of Iranian manufacture.
“You guys are lucky no one was killed,” the expert explained. He was video conferencing with FBI agent in charge, Special Agent Wilhelm. “That’s a fragmentation grenade. Killing radius is eight meters.”
“We don’t often see military explosives in domestic bombings,” Wilhelm said. “Usually it’s homemade IEDs. You sure it’s Iranian?”
“Absolutely. The markings are distinctive, as is the overall design. It’s a rough copy of the older pineapple-style hand grenade popular during the mid-twentieth century.”
Wilhelm was studying the photograph displayed over the video link. “This is the condition of the grenade when it was found?”
“That’s right. Apparently, a patrol officer found it at the base of a dumpster about a block away from the second explosion. The pin was still in place. It was completely safe.”
“That’s odd. Why would the bomber place three grenades, pulling the pin and setting each to explode when the trash bins were moved, and yet fail to arm the fourth device?”
The Army expert shrugged. “Can’t help you there. Anyway, that’s all I have. Let me know if any other questions come up during your investigation.”
“Yeah, sure. Thank you.” And then a moment later, just before the expert hung up, “Oh, one more question.”
“Sure, what is it?”
“Any idea how someone in New York would come into possession of Iranian hand grenades?”
“Well, the obvious answer is your suspect is connected to Iranian military, maybe the Revolutionary Guards.”
Wilhelm had already thought of that possibility. “Yes, but how does he get the grenades—let’s say there were four of them—into this country? It wouldn’t be easy to get hand grenades through airport security; I don’t care what country you’re in.”
“Like I said, beats me. Maybe he’s a diplomat?”
“Iran and the U.S. don’t have diplomatic relations.”
“Sorry, I can’t help you with that one. Give me a call if you have questions of a military nature.”
Special Agent Wilhelm eased back in his chair, deep in thought. How would I smuggle grenades from Iran into New York? If the answer involved secure diplomatic pouches, it would have to be through a government friendly—or at least sympathetic—to the Islamic Republic of Iran. I don’t even know how to begin investigating that angle.
He decided to see what forensics came up with. Maybe the facial images captured by the security cameras would return a positive ID after running through the many data bases maintained by U.S. and European agencies.
Wilhelm sighed. He was a realist, and he knew that short of a miracle, if the facial recognition software came up empty, this case would go cold within a week.
Chapter 2
Bend, Oregon
April 8
The chime from Emma’s phone woke her from a fitful slumber. She glanced at the clock—5:30 a.m. Hopeful that it was the email she had been expecting, she rolled out of bed, grabbed her laptop, and quietly entered the kitchen so as not to wake Kate. While her PC was booting up she heated a mug of water in the microwave and began steeping a tea bag—black tea infused with orange and spices—and returned to her desk. There it was, an email message from Jon Q with a single large PDF attachment.
The file was titled “Traitors Within.” She thought that odd, but then realized almost everything about this contact was odd. The communication was always email, always using aliases, anonymity being of paramount concern. Emma knew almost nothing of her contact—gender, age, race—all unknown. She didn’t even know if he—she had a mental picture of her contact as a nerdish male, about twenty-fiveish—lived in the United States or abroad.
And then there was this whole dark web thing. Emma wasn’t a computer geek, but she had heard of the dark web—mostly in news reports about arrests of hackers charged with stealing financial and personal data. Emma had surfed several online forums about hacking government sites until she made the connection with Jon Q. That was almost three weeks ago.
When Emma explained her request and how it had irreparably affected her family, Jon Q bragged that he could access the Department of Defense records and get the information she was seeking.
“But how can you be certain?” she wrote. “You don’t even know where this information is. It could be anywhere after all these years—or nowhere. For all we know, it may have been deleted as part of the cover up.”
“Relax Cupcake.” That was Jon Q’s pet name for Emma. She hated it.
“With the exception of eighteen minutes of the Nixon tapes, Big Brother never deletes anything. The information is there—always is. Just waiting for me to find it and bring it into the light of day.”
“Why do you do this?”
“It’s my duty as a patriot to expose the corruption and waste that pervades every aspect of government.”
“You’re not a terrorist, are you?”
“Cupcake, you really need to chill. I’m not going to blow up anything. I’m not a terrorist.”
“Then why are you doing this?” she wrote back. “You can’t expect to change anything. People have tried before—you know, exposing government secrets, embarrassing secrets. And nothing changes, not really.”
“I already told you. That and the money.”
Emma sighed when she read that in the email. Of course she knew payment would be required. But it wasn’t the first thing Jon Q demanded, so she allowed herself to believe that maybe he wasn’t going to ask for much.
“Naturally,” she wrote. “For love of country and money. Look, I’m a student. I don’t have much.”
“Already trying to negotiate my rate down, and I haven’t even quoted you a price. Like I said, I’m on a mission—you might call it a crusade—to expose the lies and dirty secrets powerful people in Washington don’t want Joe Citizen
to know. Sounds like you might be onto something here, a really juicy secret. So, I’ll cut you a deal. I’d normally get ten grand for this type of job. But for you, this job, I’ll settle for five.”
By the time the negotiation was concluded, Emma had worked the price down to $3,000—all of her savings—payable in bit coins. Harder to trace, Jon Q had explained.
That was two weeks ago.
She was beginning to believe that Jon Q was running a scam; that he had taken her savings and would never actually hack the records that had been buried for close to half a century: records of a violent battle that claimed her grandfather’s life—a battle that should never have occurred.
Emma had not received any messages from Jon Q for close to two weeks, but now she had this email and file. She double clicked on the icon. Several seconds later the file opened and filled her screen.
The PDF document was actually a large collection of official reports and memos. At least they looked official, some with a Department of Navy header and seal, others from the State Department. There were even memos from the Department of Justice and the White House. The font was irregular, as would have been the case for typed documents from the period. They were all dated 1967, as early as June and then moving forward into July, August, and September.
Her hand gripped the teacup, squeezing until her fingertips turned white as she read. And she continued reading, even as the tea cooled to lukewarm.
She never heard Kate approach, and when her roommate gently placed her hand on Emma’s shoulder, she startled.
“You’re up early. Is everything alright?” Kate asked.
“Oh, uh, yeah—just couldn’t sleep.” Emma minimized the PDF file, allowing Kate only a brief glimpse.
“What are you working on?”
“Oh this? Just some research for my history paper. Thought I’d get an early start on it.”
Kate eyed her friend suspiciously. “You sure everything is okay?”
